Thinking further about my situation, I’m thinking about a chapter I recently read by Robert Merton.[1] He highlights a discrepancy between socially approved goals and the available means for achieving those goals. And I’m remembering that as my life fell apart—which might be said to have occurred at any or some or all of multiple points along my journey—it was apparent to me that this society kicks people who are down. It does not act humanely; rather it stigmatizes them and, for the most part, never lets them up.[2]
In my own experience this appears as, no matter what skills I acquire, the jobs are exported or I will not be hired; no matter what jobs I accept, I am abused and paid less than what it costs to live; and now, no matter how high a level of education I acquire, higher education will be defunded, so my employment prospects remain dim. As I’ve noted, I’ve been resisting taking this personally. But it is apparent that some way, some how, I ended up on the wrong side of a merciless and unforgiving society whose ethical basis is challenged.
- [1]Robert K. Merton, “Social Structure and Anomie,” Social Theory: The Multicultural and Classic Readings, 4th ed., ed. Charles Lemert (Boulder, CO: Westview, 2010), 229-242.↩
- [2]Claude S. Fischer, Michael Hout, Martin Sanchez Jankowski, Samuel R. Lucas, Ann Swidler, and Kim Voss, “Why Inequality?” Great Divides: Readings in Social Inequality in the United States, Thomas M. Shapiro, ed., 3rd ed. (New York: McGraw Hill, 2005), 9-15; Herbert J. Gans, “The Uses of Undeservingness,” Great Divides: Readings in Social Inequality in the United States, Thomas M. Shapiro, ed., 3rd ed. (New York: McGraw Hill, 2005), 85-94.↩